On 11 October 2017, the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) issued an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) authorisation for a new nuclear power plant and a radioactive waste disposal facility at Koeberg, about 26 km North of Cape Town. The public (this includes all South African citizens) may appeal this decision by 4 March 2018.
We have a short window of time to make sure our government is held accountable by its citizens, and truly hears that South Africans don’t want expensive nuclear energy, we want affordable and accessible renewable energy.
Using nuclear energy to generate electricity is outdated, unnecessary, and goes against our collective moral imperative to care for people and planet. A world wounded by rampant exploitation requires ethical leadership and the pursuit of eco-justice.
You can have your say by filling in your details here to send an email directly to the Department of Environmental Affairs and Eskom, and if you have more to say, you can edit the standard email text.
The Tihange Nuclear Power Station is located on the bank of the Meuse river, near the Belgium village of Tihange. Image: Electrabel
Why do we fight against nuclear energy in SA?
- Research – which includes the government’s own science institute – has concluded that SA does not need more nuclear energy.
- The nuclear deal will bankrupt SA, drawing funding away from other essential services like health, education and social grants.
- There is no safe dose of nuclear radiation, which causes cancers, and other illnesses. (Small amounts of nuclear material are used in medicine and can be produced in a controlled way. SAFCEI is not against medical use.)
- Nuclear plants are very expensive to build, yet have a short lifespan of 40-80 years, after which they must be decommissioned… leaving the land unusable for thousands of years.
- Nuclear power is risky. Devastating disasters, including Fukushima in Japan, have destroyed the lives and the livelihoods of tens of thousands of people.
- Alternatives to nuclear are available at far lower cost, which will decentralise energy access and use and put power in the hands of people.
- Eskom has failed to sign long-overdue renewable energy purchase agreements, stalling the sector’s development.
- Nuclear build plans in South Africa have been conducted unlawfully. Earthlife Africa (JHB) and SAFCEI to went court to stop unlawful govt decisions, and we were successful. But the govt has already spent hundreds of millions of rand on these unnecessary plans, and is continuing to plan for nuclear energy power plants.
A world wounded by rampant exploitation requires ethical leadership and the pursuit of eco-justice. Using nuclear energy to generate electricity is outdated, unnecessary, and goes against the moral imperative to protect people and planet.
Nuclear power generates very few jobs compared to other energy power:
It took 3.8 billion years of evolution to produce us and the environment that supports us. The only sensible thing for us to do is to work in harmony with everything that exists not use part of it to make the rest uninhabitable which is what going nuclear does.
My understanding was that the Nuclear program was just stopped in the latest budget